


the blade swings down

by razbliuto



Category: One Piece
Genre: Drama, Gen, Surreal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-08
Updated: 2018-06-08
Packaged: 2019-05-19 20:09:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14880407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/razbliuto/pseuds/razbliuto
Summary: After years of preparation, Zoro fights the strongest swordsman in the world. — Zoro, Mihawk.





	the blade swings down

Zoro follows the blood.

He follows the scent like a hungry shark. He passes through the graveyard of swords and the rotting bodies of men who were too weak to defeat the king.

Thunder rumbles. White forks of lightning careens through the dark sky and rain lashes across his brow. Even nature is attuned to the force of the greatest swordsman in history.

He splashes through mud and blood and shattered armor. Bodies of the defeated grow in number as he draws closer to the center of the battlefield. In the eye of the storm, a single throne sits atop a flight of crumbling marble steps.

He sees the figure standing at the top, and a dark shiver trembles down his back. Zoro knows it is the shadow of Mihawk, shrugging off his coat with a flex of his arms. He holds a sword taller than him, but wields it as smooth as water. He knows this sword; he’s seen it in his dreams. Yoru, bringer of a thousand nights. It glides silently, as though the blade is cutting through the very idea of breathing. The shadow rests the sword over his shoulder. The king is waiting for him.

His blood burns. The scarlet thunderclouds are a rapturous background for this final duel. There are no gods or demons left on this earth; only men. Only flesh and bone and survival. Only him and Mihawk. Victory or death.

At the bottom of the steps, Zoro reaches for Wado Ichimonji.

“Roronoa,” the voice says, and it is not Mihawk’s voice, not at all, and his eyes widen because there standing at the top of the stone slabs is—

A swordsman who got there before him.

A swordsman, and clenched in her bloody hands is the black blade Yoru.

Blood drips down the marble steps. Behind her, Mihawk reclines almost lazily on the throne. The broken tip of Shigure protrudes from his chest.

Zoro halts. His hand is frozen on Wado Ichimonji.

“ _You_?” The word is practically forced out of his throat.

Tashigi steps forward. Her footsteps echo among the colossal ruins. Those cracked glasses flash as lightning seethes overhead. A long red scar stretches down her face, from forehead to chin. She does not smile, and gazes down at him with fierce sovereignty; a look Zoro remembers because he once looked at her the same way on Loguetown, years ago.

“Were you expecting someone else?” Tashigi asks.

At her side, Yoru hums. Mihawk’s—no, her sword sings like a nightmare. She lifts it gently in one hand, as though flicking rain off the blade, and in the sky a thundercloud parts with a light gasp, cut in two—no, fours—no, all the storm clouds as far as he can see disintegrate in a whisper, and then there is nothing but an endlessly blue sky. The storm is gone.

The years of hunting pirates—funny, that, when  _he_  was called  _pirate hunter_ —has sharpened her technique to a needlepoint. Tashigi wields Yoru with terrible perfection, and Zoro feels a numbing sensation that something worth more than all of Raftel’s gold had been stolen from him. Perhaps it had never been his to begin with.

He squeezes Wado Ichimonji’s handle so tight he thinks he could break his own bones.

“It’s about time,” she says, her eyes like calm fire, “we finish the duel that began on Loguetown.”

Victory or death. Zoro unsheathes Wado Ichimonji, Shusui, and Sandai Kitetsu. Tashigi grins slightly and raises Yoru, and her blue hair catches the harsh sunlight glinting off her sword and burns like a halo. Like something familiar.  _Kuina_ , he thinks,  _are you watching this?_

Leaping from the throne, the strongest swordsman in the world swings down her blade.

_fin_


End file.
